The Cultivated Self: Engaging Nature in the Gardens of The Ambassadors

Authors

David Wolf, Portland State University

Published In

The Henry James Review

Document Type

Citation

Publication Date

1-2019

Abstract

Henry James grounds the representation of consciousness in an ecological aesthetics. Complicating first wave ecocriticism's method of naive mimesis while qualifying poststructuralism's privileging of textuality, this essay shows nature in James to be real and potent, if bound and collaborative with culture. James situates nature in European gardens, environments that model the intricacy and scope of Jamesian social and epistemological relations. Focused on The Ambassadors (1903), this analysis traces Strether's evolution through four intratextual garden scenes, showing how they link back from as they look forward to the Lambinet landscape analepsis, the germ and the consummation of Strether's transformative narrative.

Description

Copyright © 2019 Johns Hopkins University Press

Locate the Document

https://doi.org/10.1353/hjr.2019.0006

DOI

10.1353/hjr.2019.0006

Persistent Identifier

https://archives.pdx.edu/ds/psu/28025

Citation Details

Wolf, D. (2019). The Cultivated Self: Engaging Nature in the Gardens of The Ambassadors. The Henry James Review 40(1), 63-81. Johns Hopkins University Press.